Given the number of Facebook pages that have “The Good Old
Days” in their title, this may prove to be a controversial post. Here goes.
Let me begin by correcting a popular misconception: “Myth” is not a euphemism for “Lie.” Quite the contrary; EVERY myth has a grain of
truth at its core. Unfortunately, a
number of people apply coats of “polish” to that grain, seeking to render it
more as they wish it to be. The result
may be striking, quite well known and believed, as a myth, leaving its basic truth hopelessly obscured. Over history, this process has usually taken time to
accomplish. In today’s world of
hyper-communication, myths can emerge fully polished in almost no time at all.
I previously identified “Subsidized Housing” as such a myth,
whose actual shape and community significance are much misunderstood. In this post I focus on “The Good Old Days.” The concept is an excellent example of a myth: a grain (or in this
case, much more) of truth distorted by the unconscious workings of the human
mind and the conscious manipulation of advertising agencies. I’m not going to attack this myth; merely try
to remove some of its encrustations, and better reveal its true shape.
Many professionals (and not just historians) recognize that there is nothing new about the
belief that “The Good Old Days” were back when we were young, or at least
younger. This is a repetitive
occurrence, a generation concluding that the significant events in local
history—at least the bad ones—took place within their lifetime or that of their
parents. The oldest recorded laments
about the decline of society and the younger generation follow shortly after
the invention of writing, and were no doubt passed along verbally before then. Many things have changed, but this still
remains the same. How many older people
do you know who believe that things are better now than they used to be,
regardless of all the evidence? Even the
fact that there are more of them living longer to complain doesn’t even seem to
register. It’s part of the generational aging
process, apparently. When you are young,
the world is fresh and new; your experiences register deeply, largely because
they are the first. You age, things
change, dreams die and those early experiences begin to take on a rosy
glow. It happens with every generation,
and it always has.
Remember how the TV show “All in the Family” opened? Archie and Edith Bunker, sitting around the piano
singing (off key) “Those Were the Days”?
When were their “Good Old Days”?
When you “didn’t need no welfare state, everybody pulled his
weight”? The 1920s? The 1930s?
Does anyone still believe that
“We could use a man like Herbert Hoover again”?
Yet “All in the Family” was onto something; your early memories
count, and will always take on a rosy glow, even about times like the Depression. A lady named Mary Early, who I
interviewed for my book, expressed it perfectly:
“If we were poor, we didn’t know it, because nobody else had anything
more than we did.” Things will never be
the quite like they were when we were young.
We are all Citizen Kane, dying with our individual “rosebud” on our
lips. Nostalgia will always sell.
Part of nostalgia’s attraction is its core of truth;
“progress” is a very relative term. Joni
Mitchell has expressed this from both sides; while she has said that “You don’t
know what you got till it’s gone,” she has also reminded us that “something’s
lost but something’s gained, in living every day.” The question is, have we gained more than we
have lost? It’s not an easy question to
answer.
And by the way, who is this “we” of whom I speak? Are we really all one? “The Good Old Days” may have been good for you,
but were they good for everyone? Here is
the important distinction, the one that we must make if we are to let
history—and not nostalgia—be our guide. Let’s
take our constant subject—community—as an example. The unpleasant truth of history is that when
you view an entire community, a pleasing overall appearance is more likely once
the details are sufficiently obscured.
I’ll begin with only the most obvious example. Does anyone really think that any period up through the 1950s was “The
Good Old Days” for African-American residents of our towns? Old Norristown hands have great memories of
the Norris Theatre, that monument to Art Deco excess (yes, I have been inside,
and loved it). But if you were black,
you could only sit in the balcony. In a
cruel irony, the attendant who enforced that rule was likely black himself
(they were okay as low-level employees).
Of course, the West-Mar theatre did not admit black people at all,
so… African-Americans for good reason
lament changes in family and community, but certainly not their place in
America’s legal or social fabric in days gone by.
Or how about the earlier “Good Old Days,” before and after
World War I, the greatest period of growth and prosperity in the history of
pretty much every local urban community east of the Mississippi? How “golden” was it for the children, perhaps
all of ten years, who were small enough to fit among the whirring spindles, and
thus allowed not just to work, but to work long hours? After all, they lost fingers or arms only
occasionally, and during these golden years the government definitely did not
believe in regulating “job creators.” Employing
children this young was illegal by local ordinance (the dangerous working
conditions weren’t), but in another characteristic of “The Good Old Days,” the
inspectors would turn a blind eye. Such
things were understood. Everybody knew
their place, and those who didn’t were pretty much screwed.
So, celebrate your memories, but don’t fall victim to your
own propaganda. History is always yes and no, good and bad, at the same time, because that’s the way life is. A fundamental characteristic of our
civilization is that we implicitly believe that “The Good Old Days” lie in the
future, not the past. That, not
nostalgia, should motivate our lives. Our
children will some day look back on today, tomorrow and the day after as “The
Good Old Days.” Shouldn’t we try to make
their memories the best they can be?
